#yes i changed zombozo's name because i hate the canon one

[kariachi]

So on Sunday my brain decided to throw Gwen/Mike/Kevin/Argit at me for some reason and today decided to continue with it, so.... Have a couple thousand word double feature.

~~

The house was smaller than the one Mike had been living in when they met, but just as if not more grand. Enough so that even Gwendolyn, nonetheless Kevin and Argit, had to stop as soon as they were out of the car to stare at its white stone walls, intricately paned windows, and the sheer amount of well-tended greenery and flowers. For all they had been told this wasn’t the normal place for family get-togethers due to being ‘not fit for hosting’, they simply couldn’t see it. It was still huge and gorgeous. No wonder Mike had been rolling his eyes when he said it. They couldn’t have been stood there gawking long before the front door opened to reveal a small woman dressed to impress.

“Mikey!”

“Monie!” And immediately Michael Morningstar- who in the three years since he’d gotten clean and the two he’d been a part of their little quartet had not engaged in displays of affection more grand than jewelry- bolted across the lawn, scooped the similarly excited woman up into a spin, and hugged her fiercely as soon as her feet had touched the ground.

“Remind me to get him to spin me at least once during this relationship,” Kevin grumbled as he and Gwendolyn rounded the car. “I don’t care if it happened right before he drops me into a volcano, as long as it happens.”

“Jealous, much?”

“Don’t be a hypocrite, Red. And stop scowling, she’s his cousin for fuck’s sake.” Something that was easier to tell as they came closer. There were plenty of differences- golden toned versus pink, tall versus short, blond versus grey, blue eyed versus green- but a few key features stood out. Their eyes were the same shape, they were of similar narrow build, and they carried themselves with the same proud bearing. The woman- Monie- stepped back as they approached, flashing them a toothy grin as Mike turned to present them.

“And these are my…” He goes quiet, mouth twisting and hand curling shut. They’ve never really worked out terms. Kevin and Gwendolyn were boyfriend and girlfriend, Kevin and Argit were partners, but Gwendolyn and Argit? Any of them and Mike?

“Yours?” his cousin offered in fond amusement. Mike nodded.

“Mine. Kevin Levin, Argit Levin, and Gwendolyn Tennyson.”

“Monette Morningstar,” she introduced herself, stepping around Mike and towards them. Gwendolyn stepped forward to offer a hand to shake, only to be wrapped in the same fierce hug Mike had gotten, and for Monette to quickly do the same to Kevin and Argit. “It’s a pleasure and an honor to have you here.”

“It’s a pleasure to be here,” Gwendolyn answered, still reeling a bit from getting a warmer welcome than she got from a fair chunk of her own family.

“We were beginning to think Sparkles was lying about having relatives,” Argit continued, “to make himself look better.” Kevin and Argit only had family in the Amalgam Kids and Cooper, who were always around, and they all were practically tripping over Tennysons, but Mike was the only member of his family he interacted with in their area, and the three times he’d gone to family events since they’d gotten together he’d insisted on going alone.

“Not surprised,” Monette said with a nod, “most of the others already hate you.” Gwendolyn snorted derisively while Kevin groaned beside her. They’d been warned the entire drive up, but still. “He doesn’t shut up about you, you know. Well, he hasn’t shut up about you since he was twelve-”

“Monie!” The woman kept her same easy, welcoming smile as he and Gwendolyn both went red around the edges.

“-but he’s even worse now. Shame, it would’ve been so fun to see him just drop you all on the family at once.” Stepping forward, Mike scowled at her.

“I am not putting them through that,” he said with finality as Argit snickered.

“Of course not,” she replied, waving off the very idea. “It’ll still be the funnest holiday since you ran off.” With another flash of perfect teeth she gestured them towards the house, falling in behind the little group with light steps. “Now come on, lunch is all ready and you kids must be starving-”

~~~~~

~~~~~

They had claim over the master bedroom whether they wanted it or not, their hostess more willing to eat her own legs than to risk them being crowded in one of the smaller beds. Not that it was much of a concern. Kevin had always been a tactile man, Argit had been born for piles of people, and between them it wasn’t at all difficult to cram the four of them into a space smaller than they had available.

It just meant they got to stretch out a bit, was all.

Gwendolyn was taking up as much space as possible, her legs hanging off the side of the bed and her head on Kevin’s chest. Meanwhile Mike had pressed the whole of himself against Kevin’s other side, stretched over him just enough so he could hold a tablet in place for he and Gwendolyn to read the book on it together. Argit didn’t even bother with distractions, content to doze splayed out across the boys’ legs, tail wrapped around Gwendolyn’s wrist. This was the norm for them, and Kevin had long accepted his destiny to be a mattress, generally working on a project or a book over the others’ heads until one of them groggily forced him to set it aside and go to sleep.

He’d already set it aside himself tonight.

“So,” he said into the quiet, fighting back a smile, “are we just not going to mention the whole ‘mine’ thing?”

“Yes.” Ears twitching, Argit snickered.

“Good. I’d much rather hear about how you talk about us all the time.” Mike groaned, shifting forward to bury his face in long red hair.

“Gwendolyn, lovely, perfect Gwendolyn-”

“Sorry, it’d work with Kevin but you know I can’t shut Argit up.” She shuffled away, just enough that she could turn her head and crane up to plant a kiss on his cheek. “It was nice to hear though. You’re harder to get an ‘I love you’ out of than Argit.”

“Because I don’t love you, Red,” Argit cut in cheekily, as Mike heaved something between a huff and a groan, “I tolerate you for the men’s sakes.”

“Uh-huh,” she replied, fidgeting with his tail, “you keep saying that.” Beneath them, Kevin chuckled as he reached out to tug gently at a lock of blond hair.

“We love you too, Sparkles.” In response Mike just pulled away with roll of his eyes and a huff, as if he wasn’t going red for probably the fourth time just since they’d pulled into the drive.

“I hate you all,” he answered with far less bite than he likely intended, “and one day I’m going to eat you out of pure spite.”

~~~~~

~~~~~

The first day of their holiday was definitely the best one. A nice, if simpler than expected, lunch with Monette. Meeting Mike’s Uncle Hector (Zombozo. Mike’s uncle was Zombozo. Zombozo, who wanted to start over fresh because apparently his line in the sand was risking making things harder on his nephew.) They’d had fresh pasta and baked apples at dinner, spent the evening exchanging stories, watching movies, and looking at pictures of Mike from birth to his teen years. Pictures Mike assured them, with a pained expression, had not been gathered for this event. His cousin and uncle were just exactly the types to have them on hand.

Monette’s parents had shown up on the second day and things had started getting tense. They loved their daughter, that was evident from the first moment they’d arrived, but otherwise… Nobody could really blame them for being openly unimpressed by Hector- excepting the younger Morningstars, apparently- but they treated Mike the same way some of Gwendolyn’s relatives treated her. Loving, but with the sharp edge of impossible expectations. The rest received polite distance, like they were some fling Mike’d drug along rather than people he’d been with several years. Still, they managed a nice, if awkward, dinner, and sat up late listening to embarrassing stories of Monette and Hector’s childhoods. It wasn’t fun, but there were fresh desserts and the evening wasn’t any more painful than larger Tennyson gatherings.

The third day though, that was Thanksgiving proper, and it brought the rest of the family. The middle cousin, Teddy, and his fiancé. His parents. Great-aunt Winnie. And suddenly, like a curtain was flung open, you could see how Darkstar happened. You could even see how Zombozo started.

These people did not like mutants.

They did not like aliens.

They did not like bastard children.

It hurt to know that the two had been outnumbered for so long.

Dinner was beyond awkward. Passive-aggressive comments flew to a degree even Argit hadn’t seen before, and he made it his job to antagonize Gwendolyn’s mother’s family whenever they met. Both sides threw jabs back and forth- about people’s jobs, people’s diets (never before had Kevin been seen passive-aggressively giving someone food but the moment Winnie had said something about Mike’s appetite it had been war), people’s lifestyles, people’s taste in clothing. Nothing, it appeared, was off limits, with the exception of a single “while you’re around” comment batted at Gwendolyn that’d had Mike tensing on the other side of the table and Monette putting her foot down as hostess. What sort’ve jab it had been was unknown to the non-Morningstars in the room, but it took a good forty seconds for people to begin talking again after the snapped reprimand.

By the end of dinner nobody was in a good mood. There was a steak knife lodged to the handle in the far wall of the dining room, from where Kevin had lost his temper and flung it at Teddy’s head (in his defense, he had warned the table about making any more comments about his partners, and Monette treated it no differently than if he’d had the misfortune to drop it on the floor), Argit was muttering about “no wonder you didn’t bring out the good cutlery for these people”, Mike, Gwendolyn, and Hector evacuated the room as soon as it was polite to do so for their own mental health, and Monette had a smile on her face that was sharp enough to cut glass. It was amazing nobody (namely Winnie) had been thrown out a window and most likely that was only because they were really nice, presumably expensive, windows.

The rest of the evening didn’t even have the decency to be entertaining. Just a slog they got through with tight-lipped politeness and a healthy dose of passive-aggression before heading to bed- ignoring the pointed comments about ‘making’ Monette give up her room as they went. Mental and emotional exhaustion had them sleeping soundly, waking at first light. They stayed long enough for coffee, breakfast, and Mike to hug his proper family members goodbye before heading out before anyone could wake up enough to start in again.

They were an hour down the highway when Kevin pulled over.

“Okay, I’m saying it now,” he announced in a tone that brooked no argument, “Monie can visit anytime, your uncle is a maybe, but I am never sitting at a table with the rest of those fuckers again in my life.” The others nodded at Mike in agreement, though Gwendolyn at least had the decency to try to look sorry.

“You know,” he replied, honestly looking like a weight had been taken off his shoulders- and with how Gwendolyn could be about her own family it probably had been- “I think I can live with that.”